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Glen Hansard (Support: Ye Vagabonds)

I hadn’t actually planned to go to this concert, but the puzzledpeaces’ sister got sick and I sacrificed myself to not let the ticket go to waste. I endured the hardships of an excellent concert with great seats because that’s just the kind of selfless friend I am. Yes indeed.

Ye Vagabonds

Ye Vagabonds kicked things off. I didn’t know them before but I liked them a lot. They draw on folk songs and folk stories with their songs and if that wasn’t enough, they harmonize beautifully with their singing. They are both still pretty young, but I do hope to see more of them in the future.

As an opening act they do more to mellow the crowd and calm them down than to activate them, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. Especially not when they’re followed by Glen Hansard who is a one-person powerhouse anyway. Although this time he was there with a rather big band (the last time I saw him, he was alone on stage).

Glen Hansard

Concerts in the Konzerthaus are sitting-down affairs and I usually don’t really like that a whole lot. Mostly because I usually go to concerts where I want to move to the music and sing along, and seats make at least the former rather difficult. But with Glen Hansard that’s perfectly alright. For one, his music isn’t particularly danceable. And then there’s also the fact that he has enough energy to keep you electrified and paying attention even when you have to stay still.

Although the audience was surprisingly quiet – I think that has to do with the location as well. The Konzerthaus is a place for mostly classical concerts and it is frowned upon to sing along to Beethoven et al., at least in most cases. Hansard tried a couple of times to animate people to sing along, but he never succeeded for very long.

The atmosphere wasn’t bad though, it was just that people mostly listened and were reluctant to participate. Or at least that’s what it felt like to me. Personally I was pretty wrapped up in the stories Hansard told between songs – he is just a great storyteller.

Things got a little more flexible with the encore, where Hansard made his way into the audience and set up stage on the audio and light control table. People stood up and gathered around him and it started to feel less like a formal concert.

But in any case, it was a beautiful show with wonderful music. I can but thank puzzledpeaces’ sister for becoming ill (especially since she’s doing fine by now).